


Fatherhood

by simmer (lemonpie)



Category: Pirates of the Caribbean (Movies)
Genre: Bootstrap Bill Turner is a Good Parent, Child Elizabeth Swann, Child Jack Sparrow, Child James Norrington, Child Neglect, Child Swap, Child Will Turner, Childhood, Childhood Trauma, Gen, Implied/Referenced Child Abuse, Lawrence and Edward not so much, Weatherby Swann Is a Good Parent
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2021-01-13
Updated: 2021-01-13
Packaged: 2021-03-17 22:53:40
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,327
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/28733010
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/lemonpie/pseuds/simmer
Summary: Fatherhood: Or, how Bill Turner, Edward Teague, Weatherby Swann, and Lawrence Norrington, through some sort of magic, end up swapping children for a week.
Relationships: Bootstrap Bill Turner & James Norrington, Bootstrap Bill Turner & Will Turner, Edward Teague & Will Turner, Elizabeth Swann & Weatherby Swann, Jack Sparrow & Edward Teague, Jack Sparrow & Weatherby Swann, James Norrington & Lawrence Norrington, Lawrence Norrington & Elizabeth Swann
Comments: 3
Kudos: 28





	Fatherhood

**Author's Note:**

> dies

_ Day One _

He knew it was coming. He had been warned thrice, each time with a piece of paper handed to him by a stranger, a different one each time. Once, three weeks ago, once, last week, and once again last night. But he still hadn’t really believed it, that his wonderful daughter was going to be replaced for seven days with a different child. How could he? Weatherby Swann did not believe in magic, and never had. 

Still, part of him thought it might very well happen, and he couldn’t get to sleep. He fluttered in to check on Elizabeth regularly throughout the night, but, at around one, he had entered to find an entirely different child sprawled out across his daughter’s bed. 

It was hard to see in the dark, but he had known his daughter her entire eight years alive, and this was most definitely not her. For one, they aren’t wearing the soft, white smock he had put Elizabeth to bed in, but rather a shirt that most definitely belonged to someone much larger and a set of drawers that were utterly filthy. A boy, then. Someone’s son. 

When seven in the morning rolled around, Weatherby had managed about an hour’s rest, and was very pleased he’d thought to take this week off, just in case. If the change hadn’t happened, he could have spent it with Elizabeth, but instead he must raise this boy for the week, as if he were his own. So saying, he went to Elizabeth’s room and opened the door. 

He was entirely surprised to find the boy awake, although only barely, scratching through his thick brown hair. It was around shoulder-length on the child, and had clearly been recently brushed. In fact, the boy was relatively clean, although not as clean as his Elizabeth. He had a smear of dirt on his cheek and grass stains on his arms, but he wasn’t filthy. 

“Erm, hello.” Weatherby said, and then cursed himself. The boy raised his bleary eyes, and he was, for a moment, entirely startled to see eyes almost the exact same shade of brown as Elizabeth’s in that sun-bronzed face. “What’s your name?”

“Jack.” The boy said, stretching. He was taller than Elizabeth by a fair margin, with long arms already hardened slightly by muscle. The bridge of his nose was slightly sunburnt, and his eyes were bright with clever mischief. “Whot’s yours?”

“Weatherby. Weatherby Swann. You must be hungry.” 

Ah, yes, the way to any young boy’s heart. Food. His eyes lit up, and he scrambled to his feet. His legs were long and held bruises all over, the way any clumsy child’s would. “Come along, now.” 

Jack did indeed come along, and hurried to Weatherby’s side. When that strange child’s hand reached up to take hold of his, he was all at once reminded that this was a child, and probably one who felt even more displaced and strange than Weatherby did. “What do you like to eat?” He asked Jack, and Jack looked up at him, blinking. 

“I dunno.” He said. Far different than Weatherby’s own cultured voice, the boy sounded a little wild. “Whatever there is that we catch.” 

“Catch? My boy, do you live on a boat?” 

Brightening, Jack nodded. “Yeah! Sometimes if I’m real good and help with the fishin’ and the nets an’ all that, Dad lets me have some cake or somethin’!” Which was a good sign, but still, something about this child screams  _ wrong  _ to Weatherby, so he has to ask.

“And what if you do not help with the fishing, and you aren’t good?” 

“Brig, or sometimes if Dad is real angry ‘cause I messed up bad, he’ll make Gibbs an’ Barty take me lashes, ‘cause I’m too little to take ‘em myself. I have to watch, though.” Ah. That was it. A boy forced to see more than he should. 

“Ah.” Weatherby said. “Well, that doesn’t happen here.”

“Well, yeah, there’s no brig if we ain’t on a ship, you ain’t a captain, and Gibbs an’ Barty aren’t here to take me lashes.” 

“Of course not.” There were so many things Weatherby needed to think about just from this one conversation, because he was fairly certain by just that little bit of information that he had a pirate boy trotting at his heels. 

But a child is a child no matter what thoughts their guardian may or may not have, so Weatherby fed the child as many vegetables as he could get away with for breakfast.

He was certain he’d had the maid lay out four napkins on the table, but there were only three there now, and Weatherby couldn’t for the life of him remember if he’d removed it himself during the night or if it had been spilled on the evening before by Elizabeth or what had happened to it. 

Of course, he was used to Elizabeth. Elizabeth, who was fed enough food to keep her happy and healthy, who didn’t have to fight for every meal she got, who trusted him enough to tell him when something was troubling her. He didn’t have that kind of reputation with the pirate boy, but he won’t realize this until much, much later. 

If the food disappeared more quickly from Jack’s plate than he thought it should, he put that down to the boy being hungry, and thought no more of it. 

“Would you like to bathe now, or in the evening?” Weatherby asked Jack as they finished breakfast. It was a clever little thing, that question, because it gave the illusion of choice. Elizabeth, after all, wasn’t perfect, and as a younger child she had been much more stubborn and less likely to do as he said. 

“Now,” Jack said, having fallen for the trick. Or maybe he was eager to bathe, Weatherby wasn’t sure. Warm water must be difficult to come by on a ship, although it had been years and years since Weatherby was aboard one. So he got the maid to fill up the tub and warm the water, and Jack took off his oversized shirt and drawers and climbed right in.

When the boy was scrubbed clean and patted dry and dressed in clothes that were miraculously the right size, Weatherby began to comb Jack’s damp hair, as he did with Elizabeth each morning. It was much thicker, though, and darker, and Weatherby was fairly certain the boy had lice. Also, and this took him several moments to notice, Jack could not, for the life of him, sit still. He shifted and squirmed, played with the hem of Weatherby’s trouser leg, and, when he was finally done and lifted the comb for the last time, he was off to explore, looking in drawers and cupboards, as though every single thing he found was fascinating to him. And, though the trousers and shirt were much simpler than Weatherby would usually dress Elizabeth in, now that he was clean and groomed, Jack looked far more like he belonged. 

(Though, not entirely. Weatherby couldn’t help but notice all the little things about the wild boy he had to take care of that didn’t quite  _ fit. _ ) 

“Jack,” He called, and Jack’s head shot up. But he did notice that it took a few seconds, like the boy wasn’t entirely sure if he was the one being talked to. “Do you like animals?” 

Elizabeth loved her horses, and so, while she wasn’t here, Weatherby would take care of them for her. It was only fair, after all. “I like dogs,” Jack said, “And fishes. Me dad has a dog, calls ‘im Keykeeper. Or Mutt.” 

Keykeeper was a very strange name for a dog, but Weatherby just put that down to ‘pirates’ and left it at that. “How about horses?” 

“What’s a ‘orse?”

Jack looked up at him with wide, curious eyes, eager to learn, eager to  _ know,  _ and Weatherby found himself becoming impossibly fond of the pirate boy. 

_ Day Two _

Jack, he was learning, was a lot more difficult to deal with than Elizabeth even at her most stubborn. As he father, he had some authority over her, at least, and she did have a tendency to do as he said because he was older, he knew better. 

“Please don’t take off of other people’s plates, Jack, it’s quite rude.” Weatherby said, for what had to have been the fourth time. Thankfully, he wasn’t expecting any company this week, but if he had been, he would have sent them away at the door. 

“Why?” Jack asked, for what had to have been the fourth time. “You wasn’t gonna eat it.”

“Weren’t going to eat it.” He corrected, almost automatically. “And it doesn’t matter that I wasn’t going to, you must wait for it to be offered to you before you take it. Otherwise, people are going to get angry at you.”

Jack’s eyes widened, and he cautiously put the piece of bread he had snagged from Weatherby’s plate back down. On God’s name, he is going to give this child some manners, however much he needs to repeat himself. 

“There, see? Now, you can  _ ask  _ me if I was finished eating.” 

“But you’re done! You ain’t gonna eat it, so why can’t I have it?” Jack threw him a scowl, that would, in time, no doubt become quite intimidating. As it was, on a boy of eight, it was just adorable. When Weatherby only looked at him, he sighed, drooping. “Can I ‘ave that?”

If it hadn’t taken them almost an hour to get to this point, he might have insisted on a ‘please’. Now, though? “Of course.” And when Jack eagerly snatched up the piece of bread, he ruffled the boy’s hair briefly and said, “Well done.” 

The way Jack looked up at him, startled, eyes wide and mouth slightly open, made his heart ache. Between trying to improve Jack’s terrible diction, trying to get him to actually use  _ some  _ manners, and missing Elizabeth, he had, however briefly, forgotten that this was a child. A child who had seen things and been through things that would make adult men shake in their boots. So he softened, and gave Jack an extra piece of bread. Because he couldn’t help it. 

Despite all that he’d been through, Jack seemed to trust Weatherby at least enough to eat the food he was given, which was a fantastic start. He’d heard tales of children so ruined by what their families had done to them that they could never trust anyone again. Weatherby was determined not to let that happen to this boy. Never. He had already been through far too much, and Weatherby hated that he couldn’t have prevented it, despite not having known the boy before yesterday.

“Would you like to bathe now, or in the evening before bed?” He asked, once Jack had finished eating. But it seemed that Jack was too clever to fall for that trick again, because he narrowed his eyes, and said, “But I just did that yesterday.” 

“Yes, but in order to stay clean and healthy you must bathe once a day.” He kept his voice patient, and didn’t let his frustration at being questioned again show on his face or in his voice. Jack needed a healthy figure in his life, and if Weatherby had to be that, however briefly, then he would. 

“Would you like me to help you, or do it yourself?” 

Clever as he was, that one slid right past Jack, and he said, “I can do it myself!” As he ran up the stairs. Weatherby couldn’t help but smile, shaking his head. 

Once Jack had finished bathing - he probably hadn’t done a very thorough job, but Weatherby was willing to overlook that in favour of being pleased he actually had bathed - and, of course, getting water everywhere, he dressed in new, clean clothes, which was something Weatherby actually didn’t have to insist on, and sat on the bottom stair to put his boots on. 

It was so very strange to see him out of the corner of his eye and have to remember that, for a time, this child was his. This child would be his until the week was up, and Weatherby wouldn’t treat him any differently to how he would treat any other child in his care. “Come along, Jack.” He said, and as it always did when Weatherby said his name, it took him a few seconds to realize that Jack was, in fact, his name. 

He couldn’t help but wonder what  _ other  _ names the boy had been called to be so unused to his given one, but he shook those thoughts off 

Upon opening the back door and letting Jack see the huge garden, the boy was off, bounding across the lawn and chasing the birds that landed on the birdbath, his bright laughter making the early March morning ten times more beautiful. 

God help him, he was actually growing to like this stubborn, strong-willed pirate child. He didn't doubt that Jack would grow up to be a pirate, but, surprisingly, that didn't bother him. Perhaps because it seemed to be such a long way off. 

So he let Jack run around and play games all on his own, and only called him in for lunch. 

“Jack,” He said, softly, after they were done eating. “Do you like living on your boat?” 

“She’s a ship.” Jack said stubbornly. “An’ she’s ‘ome, right? So it ain’t a problem."

“Isn’t a problem.” Weatherby said, frowning some. “Just because it’s home, doesn’t mean you have to like it, Jack.” But Jack only got down off of the chair and scowled at him, before running off to go back outside. Weatherby didn’t fault him that - he was just a child, after all, and learning things like that was difficult for any child, especially one who had never known anything different. Still, he had laid the seeds. 


End file.
